st she heard this, "but it's not enough for a person who is going to
live. I sometimes feel as if I could eat three when those nice fresh
heather and gorse smells from the moor come pouring in at the open
window."

The morning that Dickon--after they had been enjoying themselves in the
garden for about two hours--went behind a big rosebush and brought
forth two tin pails and revealed that one was full of rich new milk
with cream on the top of it, and that the other held cottage-made
currant buns folded in a clean blue and white napkin, buns so carefully
tucked in that they were still hot, there was a riot of surprised
joyfulness. What a wonderful thing for Mrs. Sowerby to think of! What
a kind, clever woman she must be! How good the buns were! And what
delicious fresh milk!

"Magic is in her just as it is in Dickon," said Colin. "It makes her
think of ways to do things--nice things. She is a Magic person. Tell
her we are grateful, Dickon--extremely grateful." He was given to using
rather grown-up phrases at times. He enjoyed them. He liked this so
much that he improved upon it.

"Tell her she has been most bounteous and our gratitude is extreme."

And then forgetting his grandeur he fell to and stuffed himself with
buns and drank milk out of the pail in copious draughts in the manner
of any hungry little boy who had been taking unusual exercise and
breathing in moorland air and whose breakfast was more than two hours
behind him.

This was the beginning of many agreeable incidents of the same kind.
They actually awoke to the fact that as Mrs. Sowerby had fourteen
people to provide food for she might not have enough to satisfy two
extra appetites every day. So they asked her to let them send some of
their shillings to buy things.

Dickon made the stimulating discovery that in the wood in the park
outside the garden where Mary had first found him piping to the wild
creatures there was a deep little hollow where you could build a sort
of tiny oven with stones and roast potatoes and eggs in it. Roasted
eggs were a previously unknown luxury and very hot potatoes with salt
and fresh butter in them were fit for a woodland king--besides being
deliciously satisfying. You could buy both potatoes and eggs and eat
as many as you liked without feeling as if you were taking food out of
the mouths of fourteen people.

Every beautiful morning the Magic was worked by the mystic circle under
the plum-tree which provided